Led Lolly Yellow Lolly

10 hours ago, nobodysfriend said:

I have no family left . So , when moving here , I sold everything , except what we put in a container and sent here ( wife's name ) .

I did not want to have to worry what might happen  if I left the stuff in storage etc .

Good decision . If you own something that you never use anymore , just sell it .

If you have to worry what may happen to your stuff , it is just a weight more to carry . Be free ...

Ditto that, no friends or family UK side that have any interest in me, or me in them. It was November, so a good bonfire night. Everything went into that fire, the huge pile of paperwork that had gone into my wife and stepdaughter's British Citizenship application, furniture, clothes, anything the local charity shop didn't want. I knew we wouldn't be going back, so I remember it being a cathartic experience. We then spent a week at a Heathrow Airport hotel while I tied up loose ends, sold the car etc, boarded a flight, and that was that, gone.

There's an underground car park in Maida Vale in London that I liked to use whenever I drove into London (right next to Maida Vale Tube station). There are (were?) a number of old luxury sports cars, old Porches etc parked up, some of them that appear to be from the 70s, with inches of dust on them, flat and perished tyres, torn and shabby car covers, look like they've been parked there for decades. It always made me wonder, is someone still paying for them to be there? Strange really.

What, the entire internet?!

That's the CAT building in the midground by the way.

19 hours ago, Thailand said:

Whilst wearing his mask as protection against the smog?

I think it depends if it's safe smog or foreign smog.

I have to be honest, it's pretty frustrating that people don't get the difference between the two. A debit card only lets you spend what you have on deposit, why electronic contact with the issuing bank is so important for that to work. A credit card is a guarantee to the entitiy placing a holding the credit line that payment will be made. In other words, it is possible to go over your credit limit. Once the hold is authorised, the credit card issuer have promised to pay. . .

About your question, the difference is that even though you have not passed the credit check for a credit card, you can still get the benefits and convenience of having a credit card by guaranteeing it yourself, with your own money. That's why it's called a secured credit card. There are still times when you cannot use a debit card, for example where the retailer has lost or has no electronic connectivity.

About surcharges in Thailand, they're becoming rare now and have no real basis on reality. More often than not, the retailer is just using it as an excuse to pad your bill. This is 2020 for FS. Personally, I've never been charged a surcharge at hotels for using a credit card. Never paid a surcharge at Watsadu, Global House, Mega Home, HomePro, Robinsons.. . etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. . . .

I had a big fire in the back garden. To paraphrase Dylan Thomas, what a lovely fire it was.

3 hours ago, mvdf said:

 

This is typical American mentality fraught with nonsense.

 

I have debit cards with raised (embossed) numbers. Clearly states "debit" below the mastercard and visa logos. Perfectly accepted at Hilton, Marriott, Ibis, Novotel, Sofitel, Intercontinental and other hotels. None of my debit cards were rejected whilst I was in Europe, Australia. Deposits were charged to the card and later reimbursed without drama. I met someone from Denver two days ago. His card didn't have a chip. 2020 and the cashier at Aeon was wondering what to do with it. Swiping it with uncertainty in her face, not knowing what to do with the ancient relic.

 

 

Hmm, well I'm British, and the British also have a system called Visa Delta, in which the debit cards are also cheque guarantee cards, so they have raised numbers so the card can be carbon swiped to guarantee the cheque. Each country has it's own banking system, banking rules, and idiosyncrasies. The OP asked about credit card for farangs in Thailand, this is what I am responding to, and I can tell you, you won't be able to reserve a hotel room without a credit card in Thailand. You can take that or leave it.

If you put your debit card details into an Agoda booking, the hotel will later call you and asked for a credit card, or cash payment via bank transfer.

2 hours ago, ukrules said:

 

That's a little weird because the it's a routine thing to do a 'pre auth' on a debit card around the world.

 

Why can't you do a pre auth hold on a debit card? Is this something specific to Thai banks and their non standard (Visa/MC) debit cards?

 

Thailand does a lot of things 'non standard'. I'm not a banker, I can only comment on my experiences running hotels in Thailand. I think with a debit cards, it's a kind of pseudo hold, where the money is gone from your account already, whereas with a credit card, you're earmarking a credit line. If you check into a hotel with a debit card, you're effectively paying in advance, not having funds 'held'. Certainly here, you won't be able to reserve a room, or secure your stay, without a credit card. Pay the balance on check in, yes, pay the security deposit in person, yes, reserve with a bank transfer, yes.

It might be interesting to post images of what we get from OTAs. Agoda for example send larger operations like ours these credit cards, we have one for each of our properties, so we can just charge what they owe us to our PDQ machine. Note the raised digits on the cards. You might also observe the time it takes for a payment to authorise when you pay for something. A debit card will always pause for a few seconds while it contacts the mothership for auth code, whereas in my experience, the transaction occurs almost instantly with a credit card. Something very different is going on with the process.

3 hours ago, carlyai said:

Won't that defeat the MOV box setup? Soon as you get an energy spike the fuse is going to blow. Don't you just want to shunt the excess energy to ground and away from your connected equipment without having to replace components all the time?

 

Ideally yes, all you want to do is shunt away the transients and everything keeps working thereafter. However, the handful of circumstances where I use a fuse would be on an equipment rack with expensive IT, Cisco switches etc etc, I'd rather have the fuse blow out of the circuit, providing further mitigation (both the L and N side are fused), and have the relatively minor inconvenience of replacing a fuse than several 30,000 Baht rackmount switches. If the fuse blows, the rack will keep running on batteries for 4 hours, plenty of time for someone to replace the fuse. I'll take a picture of my setup later. . .

I understand. I'm just highlighting that hotels have PDQ machines, but they will not accept debit cards as security, or reservations, only cash, credit or charge.

17 minutes ago, Catkiwi said:

I have never asked for a credit card however, with the debit card you can charge anything, at any place that has a credit card machine.

 

Unfortunately this is not true. There are times when only a real credit card is acceptable. For example, securing a reservation at a hotel. A debit card will never be accepted. Also, the digits on a credit card are raised, so an old fashioned knuckle chop machine can be used to take an imprint in the absence of electronic communications (such as on flights with no internet when you pay for duty free). Debit card digits are flat i.e. 'electronic use only'.

Credit cards are a must have in a number of situations.

A quick blow inline fuse should take care of that.

I have a credit card form KrungSri. I understand a lot of foreigners use Kasikorn but I have accounts with SCB and the aforementioned. Foreigners CAN get credit cards, either based on income, or, as stated above, secured with money on deposit. The way it works is if, for example, you want a 90,000 Baht credit line, the bank lock 100,000 Baht of your money on deposit. Or, you can just apply for a normal credit line backed by your income. In either case, the credit card builds your credit history with the reference agency.

A lot of nonsense bandied around on this topic. The plomplem is you walk into a branch and ask about credit cards, or secured credit cards, and you're met with the boiler plate "foreigner no can have", or "Thailand mai mee kaa".

Obviously, the banks are going to be choosy, like anywhere else.

Just show her the price of a cucumber

I've seen enough of Ingrish teachers in Thailand over the decades to know why the level of spoken English all over Thailand is so poor. I was frustrated by it before I had kids here, and now I have kids here I'm pretty selective about where they go to school (well, went in the case of my adult daughter). I think the best thing that can be done for the OP is be candid. I think that you should want to come here for other reasons than being all luvved up with a bit of squeeze you were nobbing at university, you'd be like a kid in a candy store when you get here anyway, the relationship is doomed. Frankly I wouldn't want a reckless kid with garbage grammar teaching MY kids.

Sure, we all make mistakes when young, anyone can teach English and might even find a passion for it, but there are reasons English is so bad in Thailand, low standards. Teachers should have the very highest standards, in background, behavior and actual skills in the language they dare to teach, which the OP clearly lacks.

On 11/27/2020 at 10:49 PM, NilSS said:

I've had some luck protecting the more expensive light fittings with 3 MOVs per fitting in a delta between L, N and E

 

 

 

 

Further to my above comment, coincidentally I threw up some street lights last night, this is what I am doing with the MOVs. The model is S20K275 and I buy them in bags of 100 from https://www.es.co.th . . . This has massively reduced failures. . .

I haven't read every post in detail, but I don't think anyone's mentioned one of the most important factor i.e. mold growth. If you're going to invest ฿฿฿฿฿ in something to plonk your bones on, you don't want to be keeping it in a room with ambient, moisture laden air, the humidity alone will kill off your investment in a few short years, maybe sooner. Mold doesn't care if the product is expensive or inexpensive. Mold will also grow on the inside of the sofa, so don't think it's not there just because you can't see it. Air conditioning, 24/7, is crucial. I keep my private office humidity controlled 365 days a year, there's just too much important stuff in the room, mold will grow on anything organic.

I don't really understand all the fuss about IDP. If you live in Thailand, and travel outside Thailand, you use your Thai Driver's Licence, as others have stated. My British Driver's Licence still sits in a drawer, I keep it for sentimental reasons, not sure why, but I believe Swansea expect it to be returned if it is invalidated by the fact you no longer reside in the UK, not that that is enforceable in any way. If, in the unlikely event I were to visit the UK in the future, I would use my Thai DL if I got pulled over by the police, and indeed, I believe this is the way it's supposed to be.

I'm a Minarchist, so I believe in law insofar as it prevents you from causing harm to others, or me and mine. If your stupidity kills your kids, you removed your stupidity from the gene pool, tough, but true...

So Somchai or some beetroot headed farang ride their bike to the cornershop without a helmet and risk cracking their own heads open like water melons. Oh the humanity. 

Sometimes I think farangs take themselves and their beliefs far too seriously. 

16 minutes ago, worgeordie said:

Her husband complains she fridged ...

regards worgeordie

I guess mine is too, she checked her temp with a hand reader in Central today, 32.something. Just washed her hands.

Personally I'm fascinated by the temperature cameras at airports these days. Amazing technology.

7 hours ago, SAFETY FIRST said:

I was riding my PCX down soi buakhao the other day, stuck behind a slow-moving baht bus, as I waited slowly riding I heard one of those annoying loud scooters behind so I passed the baht bus swiftly pulling over to the left to allow the Thai rider to pass. To my amazement, it was middle aged, bald, westerner riding his blinged-up Aerox with his family (wife and child) onboard, none wearing a helmet...... you'd reckon he'd be riding in a safe manner with his family as pillion. I had to laugh as he passed as I thought it was one of the funniest/silliest things I've seen for quite some time.
Seriously, this was not a funny sight, why is it that there seems to be so many middle-aged western guys not wearing helmets, sadly many elderly/geriatric men are also not wearing helmets. 
We see the Thais not wearing helmets, the Thais have not had the education we westerners have been given, I can only assume all of those westerners not wearing helmets have no education. 

Education has little if anything to do with it. 'Uneducated' Thais in the UK (there are plenty of them) drive and ride according to law. . . Law is law, but law is useless without enforcement. I'm not ashamed to admit I bend the rules here from time to time. Who gives a phvk really? If I thought someone might do something about it, I might straighten out my moral compass.